Bethlehem City Council urges Legislature to decriminalize marijuana

MORNING CALL FILE PHOTO

Bethlehem City Councilwoman Olga Negron

Bethlehem City Councilwoman Olga Negron (MORNING CALL FILE PHOTO)

Daryl NerlSpecial to The Morning Call

Already having adopted a law that decriminalizes the possession of small amounts of marijuana, Bethlehem City Council approved a resolution Tuesday night urging the Pennsylvania Legislature to do the same.

More specifically, the resolution proposed by Councilwoman Olga Negron asks the Legislature to adopt a law that would empower municipal police departments to treat possession of a small amount of cannabis or marijuana paraphernalia as a summary offense rather than a misdemeanor.

City Council also gave final approvals to new ordinances that ban gender identity and sexuality conversion therapy for minors within the city limits and rezones a parcel of land to enable construction of a $15 million apartment building in the historic downtown overlooking the Colonial Industrial Quarter.

Municipal discretion to treat personal pot possession as an offense worthy of a ticket and a fine instead of time in jail has become a controversial issue in the Lehigh Valley in recent months.

While Allentown and Bethlehem have become the seventh and eighth municipalities in Pennsylvania to decriminalize marijuana, Lehigh County District Attorney Jim Martin has prevented full implementation of the new local ordinances. Martin argues that state criminal codes supersede local ordinances.

Mayor Robert Donchez said earlier this week he would likely sign the measure into law, but that doesn’t mean that people can start lighting up without fear...

Allentown, which lies entirely within Martin’s jurisdiction, continues to charge misdemeanors for cannabis possession. Bethlehem, which is split between Lehigh and Northampton counties, is enforcing the local ordinance in most of the city, but abiding by Martin’s legal interpretation west of Monocacy Creek.

Meanwhile in Easton, an effort to decriminalize marijuana remains under a cloud of uncertainty.

Mayor Sal Panto Jr., who says he supports decriminalization despite siding with the narrowest of majorities in rejecting an ordinance in March, continues to say that cities cannot decriminalize marijuana on their own without a change to the state law.

In a memo to fellow council members, Negron wrote she believes all of them agree with her that marijuana should be removed from the federal government’s list of Schedule 1 substances and legalized. “But we also know how slow our legislation moves,” she said.

“Although we have the discretion as a municipality to decriminalize it, we know very well that some municipalities do not have the support of their county district attorneys,” she continued. “That is why I believe it is imperative that we follow up with a resolution to our state legislators to let them know about our ordinance and urge them to move forward with statewide decriminalization of marijuana.”

Council voted 6-0 in favor of the resolution. Councilman Michael Colon was absent from the meeting.

Council received applause from a nearly full room after its final approval — again by a 6-0 vote — of the ordinance that bans the use of gender identity and sexuality conversion therapy on minors.

Councilman Shawn Martell said the new law is a moral imperative and declares to the world that Bethlehem is “a place of love and compassion.”

“The fact that someone can look at a child and tell them that they are wrong because of who they are is one of the worst things you can do to somebody,” he said.

The ordinance empowers the city to confiscate the business license from any licensed mental health professional who offers the therapy to a minor. The process purports to change a person’s homosexuality or gender identity based on the assumption that LGBT orientation is a mental disorder.

The practice, also referred to as reparative therapy, is widely regarded by the mental health community, including the American Medical Association and the American Psychological Association, as ineffective and potentially harmful to children.

A half-dozen council visitors spoke out in favor of the new law, including longtime local LGBT activist Liz Bradbury, the training institute director at the Bradbury-Sullivan LGBT Community Center in Allentown, who called conversion therapy a serious danger to children.

The rate of suicide attempts for these children is 57 percent, but drops to 4 percent if they have supportive parents, Bradbury said. That’s why the adoption of the ordinance sends an important message, she added.

“Tomorrow, a kid can look at the newspaper and say, ‘Mom and Dad, you may not support me, but Bethlehem City Council does.’”

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